Macron is heckled by banner-waving protesters during Dutch state visit

Emmanuel Macron is heckled by banner-waving protesters screaming ‘where is French democracy?’ while delivering speech during Dutch state visit

• Macron arrived in Netherlands today to give a speech on European sovereignty
• It comes as he battles a furore over recent comments about China and Taiwan
• Protesters interrupted his speech almost immediately with banners and chants 

French President Emmanuel Macron was interrupted and heckled by protesters on Tuesday as he delivered a keynote speech about European sovereignty in The Hague during a state visit to the Netherlands.

Macron arrived in the Netherlands earlier today to give his hotly-anticipated speech on Europe as he battles a furore over his controversial remarks on Europe and China.

It comes after the 45-year-old French leader said in an interview on Friday that Europe must not be a ‘follower’ of either Washington or Beijing on Taiwan and ‘should not be caught up in a disordering of the world and crises that aren’t ours’.

One day later, China launched large-scale combat exercises around Taiwan that simulated sealing off the island in response to the Taiwanese president’s trip to the U.S. last week. 

Macron is also facing widespread protests at home over his attempt to force much-criticised pension reforms through Parliament without a vote.  

‘Where is French democracy? When did we lose it?’ shouted the demonstrators, who dangled a banner that read ‘President of violence and hypocrisy’ from the balcony of the theatre amid Macron’s speech at the Nexus institute.

‘I can answer this question if you give me some time,’ Macron responded, before security guards bundled the demonstrators out of the hall.

French President Emmanuel Macron, right, looks at demonstrators unfolding a banner reading ‘President of Violence and Hypocrisy’ as he explains his vision on the future of Europe during a lecture in a theatre in The Hague, Netherlands, Tuesday, April 11, 2023

Macron arrived in the Netherlands earlier today to give his hotly-anticipated speech on Europe as he battled a furore over his controversial remarks on Europe and China, but was interrupted almost immediately as he began his speech 

French President Emmanuel Macron explains his vision on the future of Europe during a lecture in a theatre in The Hague, Netherlands, Tuesday, April 11, 2023

King Willem-Alexander of The Netherlands and Queen Maxima of The Netherlands welcome French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte Macron with an official welcome ceremony at the Royal Palace on April 11, 2023 in Amsterdam, Netherlands

A group of around two dozen protesters also chanted slogans outside the theatre before Macron’s speech.

The French president fielded the heckling well, recognising that it was ‘very important to have social debate’ and that ‘I can answer all the questions you have on what we are discussing in France’.

READ MORE: Fire and fury in France: Battles on the streets of Paris as riot cops charge at protesters amid country’s biggest security operation in recent history 

He said that people who do ‘whatever (they) want’ against laws they disagree with ‘put democracy at risk’.

Making the first state visit by a French president to the Netherlands for 23 years, Macron and his wife Brigitte were greeted by Dutch King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima on their arrival in Amsterdam.

The French leader stood to attention alongside them outside the Royal Palace as a band played the Marseillaise, the French national anthem. He later laid a wreath at the Dutch National Monument.

But amid the pomp and ceremony, all eyes are on Macron’s comments on China, which he visited last week.

The Elysee Palace insisted Tuesday that the president had never called for Europe to keep an ‘equidistance’ from the United States and China.

‘The United States are our allies, we share common values,’ the French presidency said.

Macron used the address to present ‘a doctrine of economic security’ against China and the United States, amid European unease over US climate subsidies.

The speech comes after Macron said in an interview with media including French business daily Les Echos and Politico that ‘we don’t want to depend on others on critical issues’, citing energy, artificial intelligence and social networks.

Macron’s comments in the same interview on Taiwan – that Europe risks entanglement in ‘crises that aren’t ours’ and should ‘depend less on the Americans’ in matters of defence – have raised questions, like his past remarks on Ukraine.

‘The worst thing would be to think that we Europeans must be followers and adapt ourselves to the American rhythm and a Chinese overreaction,’ Macron said after his three-day state visit to Beijing.

Beijing says contact between foreign officials and Taiwan’s democratic government encourages Taiwanese movements who want formal independence from China, a step China’s ruling Communist Party says would lead to war. 

The sides split in 1949 after a civil war, and the Communist Party says the island is obliged to rejoin the mainland, by force if necessary.

Macron’s comments raised eyebrows on both sides of the Atlantic.

French President Emmanuel Macron looks at demonstrators unfolding a banner reading ‘President of Violence and Hypocrisy’, left and not in the picture

King Willem-Alexander of The Netherlands and Queen Maxima of The Netherlands welcome French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte Macron with an official welcome ceremony at the Royal Palace on April 11, 2023

Queen Maxima of The Netherlands welcomes Brigitte Macron with an official welcome ceremony at the Royal Palace on April 11, 2023 in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The French president is in the Netherlands for a two day state visit

READ MORE: US ex-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo slams French president for suggesting Europe stay out of long-running spat on Taiwan’s sovereignty 

Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said the alliance with the United States was an ‘absolute foundation’ of European security.

‘Some Western leaders dream of cooperation with everyone, with Russia and with some powers in the Far East,’ he added, without naming those leaders.

US Senator Marco Rubio said on Twitter that ‘we need to find out if Emmanuel Macron speaks for Europe’.

‘A brain death has occurred somewhere, no doubt,’ said the director of the Polish Institute of International Relations (PISM), Slawomir Debski, referring to the words used by the French president to describe NATO in 2019.

But the White House said Monday it was ‘confident’ in the relationship with France despite Macron’s comments.

During the two-day Dutch state visit, Macron will have a state dinner with the king and queen, see the hot-ticket Johannes Vermeer exhibition at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and meet Prime Minister Mark Rutte on a canal boat.

The visit is meant to highlight a new dynamic between Paris and The Hague after the turning point of Brexit.

In the wake of the speech, France and the Netherlands will sign a ‘pact for innovation’ on Wednesday focusing on cooperation in semiconductors, quantum physics and energy.

They will also work to finalise a defence pact by 2024.

The French president’s domestic political troubles also threaten to intrude on the visit, with a new day of strikes against his pension reform plans scheduled for Thursday.

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